When you're accustomed to being the coolest attendee at everyone else's parties, hosting your own can be tricky. And so it goes for Nicki Minaj, whose guest verses have been the cherry atop 2010's hip-hop sundae. Fans hungry for a bigger helping of her twisted theatricality and deranged verses will be disappointed to find that her debut solo effort is watered down, sweetened up, and composed largely of Top 40 rap balladry and relationship lamentations. The two or three instances when she toughens up and lets loose are when she sounds most at home. On "Did It on 'Em," the best track here, she snickers cockily as a classically sinister, Bangladesh-produced beat twitches and builds: "All these bitches is my sons/And I'ma go and get some bibs for 'em/A couple formulas/Little pretty lids on 'em/If I had a dick, I would pull it out and piss on 'em." And you believe her. But the punch goes limp over the rest of the album. There's nothing particularly wrong with what Minaj has given us — her pipes are worthy of wide-ranging pop stardom — but the album is a misallocation of the talent and quirk that thrust her into the spotlight in the first place.

MAIN ATTRAKIONZ | 808S AND DARK GRAPES II | September 07, 2011 Following a steady stream of low-budget tracks, mixtapes, and videos posted on their Tumblr this year, the Bay-area stoner rap duo of Squadda B and MondreM.A.N. (a/k/a Main Attrakionz) have raised the stakes by offering up something that resembles a traditional release.

LIL B | I'M GAY (I'M HAPPY) | July 19, 2011 Gone are the endless declarations of hoes on his dick in groups of 30 and 100; gone are the claims that he is everyone from Ellen Degeneres to Miley Cyrus.

SHABAZZ PALACES | BLACK UP | June 09, 2011 The musical reincarnation of Ishmael Butler, the elusive Seattle rapper who makes up one-third of the semi-popular '90s jazz-rap act Digable Planets under the name Butterfly, is a lot to unpack.

FRIENDLY FIRES | PALA | June 07, 2011 For a densely layered, expertly produced dance-rock album, this second full-length from British three-piece Friendly Fires is perplexingly bland.